National Insurance

Mark Pritchard: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what steps he is taking to align the number of national insurance numbers with the number of working people.

Chris Grayling: National insurance numbers (NINos) are required for both working and non-working people. This is because NINos are also required for the administration and payment of benefits for people who are not in work and for those who have worked previously and have a call upon the national insurance contributions they have made such as State Pensioners.
	Once allocated, a NINo remains on the Department's computer system. This is because the NINo provides a permanent numerical link between the individual and their national insurance contribution record which determines entitlement to contributory benefits and state pension. The NINos of deceased individuals are retained on the system as a partner may make a claim for a contributory benefit, which is dependant on the contribution record of the deceased.
	The retention of the NINo for deceased persons on our systems—clearly marked as such to DWP staff—also provides an important counter-fraud measure in that it prevents fraudsters from hi-jacking these numbers.

Atos

Tom Greatrex: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer 
	(1)  what the total monetary value is of each contract between his Department and Atos;
	(2)  when each contract between his Department and Atos was most recently (a) agreed, (b) renewed and (c) extended.

Chloe Smith: HM Treasury do not currently hold any contracts with Atos.

Festivals and Special Occasions: Security

Bill Esterson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department 
	(1)  what assessment she has made of the use of unpaid staff by companies providing stewards for the Diamond Jubilee River Pageant; what measures were put in place to ensure the security of staff or volunteers engaged by companies contracted to provide stewards for the pageant; and whether her Department has had any discussions with the companies employed to provide stewards for the pageant on the recruitment, pay, accommodation and security of staff;
	(2)  what steps she is taking to ensure companies providing security for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games provide appropriate terms and conditions for the staff engaged by them; and if she will make it her policy that firms contracted to provide security for the Games should not be able to make a profit if they use unpaid staff;
	(3)  what checks her Department carried out in respect of Close Protection UK Ltd prior to awarding the company contracts to provide services for the Diamond Jubilee River Pageant and London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games; what contracts have been awarded to the company for these events; and how performance will be assessed.

James Brokenshire: The Government has no contractual relationship with Close Protection UK in respect of either the Diamond Jubilee River Pageant or the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
	The Diamond Jubilee River Pageant was organised by a specially created company, the Thames Diamond Jubilee Foundation. The company was responsible for all aspects of the event, including contracting stewarding for the day.
	Provision of venue security at the Games is a matter for LOCOG, as event organiser. We understand that LOCOG has been working closely with all security and stewarding contractors to ensure that appropriate standards are met, including clear assurances on pay and conditions.

Human Trafficking Ministerial Group

Mark Durkan: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department pursuant to the answer of 24 May 2012, Official Report, column 792W, on the Human Trafficking Ministerial Group, whether there was agreement on establishing a Rapporteur on Human Trafficking independent of the Inter-Departmental Ministerial Group.

Damian Green: The Inter-Ministerial Group on Human Trafficking agreed that it acts as a sufficient equivalent mechanism to act as a National Rapporteur and. Its terms of reference have been drafted to reflect this.

King's Mill Hospital

Gloria De Piero: To ask the Secretary of State for Health 
	(1)  how many patients waited longer than four hours in the accident and emergency ward at Kings Mill Hospital, Nottinghamshire between (a) January and March 2012 and (b) January and March 2011;
	(2)  how many patients waited longer than four hours in the accident and emergency ward at Kings Mill Hospital, Nottinghamshire in each of the last three years.[Official Report, 25 June 2012, Vol. 547, c. 1MC.]

Simon Burns: Information is not available at hospital level. Information is however available at trust level. King's Mill hospital is part of Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
	The numbers of patients who waited longer than four hours in the accident and emergency departments at Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in quarter 4 2010-11 and 2011-12 is shown in the following table:
	
		
			 Period Type 1 Departments—Major accident and emergency (A and E) Type 2 Departments—Single Specialty Type 3 Departments -Other A and E/Minor Injury Unit 
			 2010-11 Quarter 4 796 0 12 
			 2011-12 Quarter 4 1,310 0 41 
			 Source: Unify2data Collection 
		
	
	The numbers pf patients who waited longer than four hours in the accident and emergency departments at Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation from 2009-10 to 2011-12 is shown in the following table:
	
		
			 Period Type 1 Departments—Major A and E Type 2 Departments—Single Specialty Type 3 Departments—Other A and E/ Minor Injury Unit 
			 2009-10 1,351 0 36 
			 2010-11 991 0 25 
			 2011-12 4,074 0 135 
			 Note: Data is taken from the weekly sitrep collection for 2009-10 and 2010-11 up to July. Data is taken from the monthly sitreps collection for August, September and October 2010-11. Data is taken from the weekly A and E collection for November 2010-11 onwards. Source: Unify2data Collection

Public Expenditure

Jeremy Lefroy: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will publish a statement of his Department's expenditure in each of the last 36 months; and what steps his Department is taking to avoid an annual underspend.

David Lidington: HM Treasury publish monthly expenditure data for all Departments from their COINS database. This data is available at:
	http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/psr_coins_data.htm
	HM Treasury will publish data for the 12 months to March 2012 in August 2012.
	The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) aims to spend within 1% of its resource departmental expenditure limit (RDEL) each year. The FCO Management Board monitors the Department's budget on a monthly basis and reprioritises in-year resources in order to seek the best value for the tax-payer and to achieve the Government's foreign policy priorities.

UN Convention On Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women

Jo Swinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether the Government considered nominating a UK candidate for the committee elections for the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women to be held on 26 June 2012; and if he will make a statement.

Henry Bellingham: No UK candidate has been put forward for the elections to the Committee on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) on 26 June. The UK is committed to supporting meritocratic appointments and elections to international jobs in the United Nations and other international organisations and has a very good record in getting good UK candidates elected. The Government supports the CEDAW convention and would both welcome the nomination of good UK candidates to the Committee and support any candidate that emerged.

UN Convention On Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women

Jo Swinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether the Government has ever nominated a UK candidate for the committee elections for the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women; and if he will make a statement.

Henry Bellingham: The Government has not nominated a UK candidate for elections to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). The UK is committed to supporting meritocratic appointments and elections to international jobs in the United Nations and other international organisations and has a very good record in getting good UK candidates elected. The Government supports the CEDAW convention and would both welcome the nomination of good UK candidates to the Committee and support any candidate that emerged.

Combined Heat and Power

Mike Weatherley: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change whether he has visited any cities in Europe which are seeking to become zero carbon through the promotion of combined heat and power technology; and what research he has commissioned on such cities.

Gregory Barker: DECC Ministers and senior officials have visited a number of European cities including in Germany, Denmark and Sweden, as well as pioneering cities in the UK, to learn more about various low carbon options including CHP. Officials keep abreast of international developments as part of their evidence-gathering to inform development of the Government's long term heat strategy.

Fuel Poverty

Roger Godsiff: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what steps his Department is taking to reduce levels of fuel poverty in Birmingham, Hall Green constituency.

Gregory Barker: The coalition Government is committed to tackling fuel poverty and supporting vulnerable consumers to heat their homes at an affordable cost.
	We continue to fund the Warm Front scheme, providing low income vulnerable households, living in energy inefficient properties, with a range of energy efficient heating and insulation measures. Since 2005 Warm Front has assisted 5,721 households in Birmingham, Hall Green Constituency(1). Since the start of the scheme in June 2000 the scheme has assisted 2.3 million households across England.
	In Winter 2011-12, the Warm Home Discount scheme provided energy supplier funded discounts to well over 660,000 of the poorest pensioners across Great Britain with a core group discount of £120 off their electricity bills. Nearly 600,000 of these customers will have received the discount without having to claim as a result of data matching between Government and energy suppliers. This is a significant benefit for a group which may struggle to claim. Other low income vulnerable households may also be assisted through the scheme. Overall we expect 2 million low income vulnerable households a year to be assisted through the Warm Home Discount scheme.
	In addition, Government provides pensioner households with winter fuel payments to help with additional heating costs during the Winter. Cold weather payments are also made to low income and vulnerable households where there is an average temperature of 0°C or below for seven consecutive days. These payments have been permanently increased to £25 per week and in winter 2011-12 over 5 million cold weather payments were paid in Great Britain worth an estimated £129 million.
	(1) This information is only available post 2005.

Recruitment

Stephen Timms: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change pursuant to the answer of 21 May 2012, Official Report, column 489W, on recruitment, to what extent his Department and its non-departmental public bodies and executive agencies used name-blank CVs or the blind sift function on the Civil Service Resourcing e-recruitment system to recruit staff in the last year.

Gregory Barker: The Department of Energy and Climate Change does not use the Civil Service Resourcing E-recruitment system.
	The Department does not use name blank CVs or blind sifting for its own recruitment purposes.

Renewable Energy: Feed-in Tariffs

Chris Heaton-Harris: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what proportion of feed-in tariff payments for (a) solar and (b) wind installations have been paid on the measured input of electricity to the grid to date.

Gregory Barker: Ofgem holds data on payments made by FITs suppliers up to 31 December 2011. For the period from the beginning of the feed-in tariffs scheme (1 April 2010) until that date, the total payments made by FITs suppliers for electricity exported from FITs installations was £2,679,226.81. A significant proportion of this was for "deemed" exports for domestic installations without export meters. £613,291.37 was for exports to the grid from larger, metered installations.
	Information on payments per technology is not available; though solar PV currently accounts for the substantial majority of FITs payments.

Children: Protection

Stephen Twigg: To ask the Secretary of State for Education 
	(1)  what discussions he has had in his Department on the Working Together statutory guidance;
	(2)  whether he plans to revise the Working Together statutory guidance;
	(3)  what discussions have taken place in his Department on revising the 2010 statutory guidance on Working together to safeguard children;
	(4)  what plans he has for revising the 2010 statutory guidance on Working together to safeguard children.

Tim Loughton: The Government accepted Professor Eileen Munro's recommendation, made in her final report into the review of Child Protection ‘A child-centred system’, that a major, revision of the statutory guidance ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ is needed.
	Professor Munro argues that ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ has become too long to be practically useful and that it hinders the use of professional judgment. She believes the current guidance has led to a culture of compliance and dependency which has stifled individual professional judgment and local innovation.
	We launched a consultation on 12 June:
	‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’: statutory guidance on what is expected of organisations, individually and jointly, to safeguard and promote the welfare of children;
	‘Managing individual cases: the Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families’: statutory guidance on undertaking assessments of children in need; and
	‘Statutory Guidance on Learning and Improvement’: statutory guidance on arrangements for Serious Case Reviews, reviews of child deaths and other learning processes led by Local Safeguarding Children Boards:
	The Government is determined to take a new approach to statutory guidance that changes behaviour and helps create a culture in which professional judgment and local innovation are allowed to flourish.
	In order to develop the guidance on which we are now consulting a multi-disciplinary Professional Advisory Group was convened and has informed the Department's work on revisions to the statutory guidance.
	The three new documents provide essential clarity on requirements while allowing scope for professional judgment and innovation. I believe they will drive the behaviours that will help protect more children. The closing date for the consultation is 4 September.

Manpower

Gareth Thomas: To ask the Attorney-General what target he has set to reduce headcount across the Law Officers' Departments and its executive agency in (a) 2010-11, (b) 2011-12 and (c) 2012-13; and if he will make a statement.

Edward Garnier: The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) planned to reduce headcount by 540 in 2011-12; and has plans to reduce headcount by a further 250 in the current financial year. The CPS did not set a target for 2010-11.
	Since 2010 the remaining Law Officers' Departments have been able to meet their efficiency targets without the need to set targets to reduce headcount. No targets have been set for 2012-13.

Data Protection

Stephen McCabe: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many incidents of the loss of confidential data held by his Department have been reported in each of the last (a) two years and (b) 12 months.

Andrew Robathan: The Ministry of Defence (MOD) takes any attacks on, or misuse of, its information, networks and associated media storage devices very seriously and has robust procedures in place to mitigate against and investigate such occurrences. Furthermore, new processes, instructions and technological aids are continually being implemented to mitigate human errors and raise the awareness of every individual in the MOD with regards to cyber security. The following tables list, by year, the number of reported losses of confidential and personal data centrally reported within the MOD from 1 January 2010 to 29 May 2012. Figures will continue to be adjusted to incorporate subsequent recoveries of items, the reporting of additional losses and subsequent clarification of historic incidents. The following figures reflect the latest data held by the Joint Security Co-ordination Centre (JSyCC) as of 29 May 2012.
	In a number of these cases, the documents were historical and therefore the original protective marking would have been eligible to be considered for downgrading. This may reduce any risk of such compromises. A number of these incidents came to light as a consequence of thorough mustering of protectively marked information and revised MOD data management practices.
	It is likely that a significant number of instances relate to records of the destruction of documents not being accurately maintained, rather than documents actually having gone missing.
	Table 1 details reported incidents of the loss of confidential data in each of the last two years (2010 and 2011). Also included are incident numbers from 1 January 2012 to 29 May 2012:
	
		
			 Table 1: Loss of confidential data by year 
			  Total 
			 2010 35 
			 2011 25 
			 2012 21 
		
	
	Table 2 details reported incidents of the loss of confidential data in each of the last 12 months:
	
		
			 Table 2: Loss of confidential data by month 
			 Month Total 
			 June 2011 2 
			 July 2011 0 
			 August 2011 5 
			 September 2011 2 
			 October 2011 2 
			 November 2011 3 
			 December 2011 0 
			 January 2012 13 
			 February 2012 3 
			 March 2012 0 
			 April 2012 3 
			 May 2012 2 
			 Notes: 1. These are only the incidents that were reported and may not represent the true number of losses during this time. 2. Of the 81 incidents listed in Table 1, 25 remain under investigation. These totals may also include some losses relating to accounting anomalies during force rotation and/or disposal activities.

Publications

Jonathan Ashworth: To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills how many (a) circulars and (b) consultation documents were issued by his Department in each of the last two years.

Norman Lamb: All the consultation documents issued by The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills are publically available at:
	www.bis.gov.uk/consultations
	It is disproportionate in terms of resource and cost to determine how many circulars were issued in the last two years.

Business: Ethnic Groups

Jo Swinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what progress his Department has made, in conjunction with the Ethnic Minority Advisory Group, in assessing and tackling the barriers people from black and minority ethnic communities face in accessing business finance; and if he will make a statement.

Andrew Stunell: We are conducting a review into the barriers faced by some black and ethnic minority entrepreneurs in accessing business finance and have consulted with a wide range of external partners, including the British Banking Association and various ethnic minority business organisations, and will report on the review shortly.

Social Rented Housing: Morecambe

David Morris: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government if he will allocate additional funding for social housing regeneration in Morecambe.

Grant Shapps: Now self financing of council housing has come into effect, Lancaster, as with all authorities who have council housing stock, can now keep its rents and take complete control of how it manages and maintains its social housing in consultation with its tenants.
	The Coastal Communities Fund is also a potential source of funds for innovative regeneration projects that promote economic growth and jobs in social housing and other areas within Morecambe.
	The Department published “Regeneration to enable growth: A toolkit supporting community-led regeneration” in January 2012, which outlined the tools, powers and flexibilities available to local areas to drive community-led regeneration.
	Lancaster city council will receive £1.9 million to tackle clusters of empty homes in their area, bringing 114 empty homes back into use.
	And the Homes and Communities Agency's Affordable Homes Programme has agreed funding in the Mid Lancashire area of £19.5 million to deliver over 900 affordable homes for rent and affordable ownership properties for the period 2011-15. Morecambe, as part of the Lancaster city council area, is part of the Mid Lancashire area along with Chorley, Preston, South Ribble and West Lancashire.